Volume 2 Issue 5

Published by Lee Thevenet

Sept-October, 2010

HORSELESS CARRIAGE REPLICA NEWSLETTER

A Publication Publication dedicated to the reporting of news, events, articles, photos, items for sale, etc, having to do with replica replica horseless carriages. Newsletter published six times a year and special issues when needed.

From the Editor

Hi Builders, Wow, this Show & Go Season is certainly off to a good start. Of coarse I mean the Car Show & Parade season & for you builders who have already completed a carriage, I hope you are signing up for all the events in your respective areas. Page The past year went by so quickly, I again In This Issue neglected to install a folding bow top on my From the Editor.....1-2 Ford N Replica to help with the extreme heat at Toon & Crossword......2 the parade events. Besides the usual Honey Doo Tool Time3-4 Jobs, I decided to do something for shop Building My First Car (Pt 4)...5-7 Visiting Old & New Friends8 comfort that I want to share with all of you Recently, I came across a really hard to My HCR Lock Downs.9-11 How & Why we get Standards..12-13 pass up deal on a used mobile home A/C-Heat An E-Mail from Stu Martyn..13 unit. An earlier model that is self contained with Heard about the Abbotts?........14-15 the large in/out ducts. I started thinking on how HCR Member Decals...15-16 I sweat & freeze in my un-insulated, un-cooled & Bulletin Board...16-20 un-heated shop, trying to enjoy the hobby of HCR building.

Well, after making a few contacts to friends that I had been acquainted with for years, the old workshop is now insulated, cooled, heated & really comfortable. I figured that I was not getting any younger & deserve to be comfortable when trying to enjoy the fun in building. What a pleasure it is now to go out to the shop. While I was getting this done for comfort primarily, I decided to also add a few more lights & install a used ceiling fan we had recently taken down in the house to replace with a new one. I also re-painted the tool storage cabinets & added a couple of new ones. Now I face a new problem, no longer can I say it is too hot or too cold when presented with new Honey Doo Jobs or Why dont you finish that project before starting a new oneSimply can not winSee what I mean?

Toon & Crossword

By

Lee

No, I didnt see where JR went, but this is what is left of his Quad

Across 1. Can not decide what to _ _ _ r 3. Garments 7. Our hobby is to build _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ s Down 2. Era 5. To steer a carriage 6. Carriages we build 4. Practice safety _ _ _ _ driving Solve the puzzle & make a sentence with the words Answers: Page 11

Tool Time
by

Lee Hi Builders, Next time you are walking across a parking lot full of vehicles, check out the rear bumper hitch area & lower tailgates on the pickups. Chances are you will see one or more with damaged rear bumpers or tailgates due to the owner probably trying to back up to a boat, utility or transport trailer without someone guiding him. With more of you looking into purchasing an enclosed transport trailer to transport your prized HCR, you might just want to look closely at this item. Perhaps this is your first trailer & you are not used to hooking up one. You might just be glad you have one of these. I picked up one the other day for myself & man does it save getting in & out of the P/U to see how close you are to the trailers coupling when you are alone & trying to hook up. Pick one up next time you shop. They are telescopic & when the two tennis balls touch youre thereYou will thank me! Magnetic Trailer Alignment Kit Worth every bit of $9.99

This angle finder is a really neat item that comes in handy, when building the body & frame, of that new HCR. I could not pass this one up Dial Gauge Angle Finder $3.99 Found both at the Harbor Freight Store Also available from Northern Tools & Supply

& For Those Who Have A Little Over $9.99 To Spend

You could do what Gerry Hale explained to me in an E-Mail recently Lee My brother-in-law in Colorado just bought a new P.U. and it has a back-up camera on it which he really likes for hooking up trailers and it looked good to me. When we returned home I started checking out back-up cameras on the web. The prices are all over the place. Good ol E-Bay had one for under $50 , so that's what I bought. It mounts by the license plate. I mounted the 2 1/2" monitor on the back of the sun visor, you can see exactly where you are and also, the height of the trailer coupler So far, so good Gerry

Really nice set up, Gerry Lee

Building My First Car

By Terry Wright

Part Five

Powder Coating
I have been working on this build since July 2009. I have finally got the chassis and all the metal parts ready for paint. I had originally planned on painting all the steel myself, as I reasoned that Powder Coating would be totally out of my budget. I had worked with this oily, messy, nasty steel for over six months and now it was time to get even messier as I prepared to clean the steel, rid it of all rust, and then prime and paint. I didnt look forward to this step at all. I was recently visiting a friends machine shop (Randall Chapman of Chapman Tools) when he suggested I should have it powder coated. He recommended a powder coating company in a neighboring County. A quick phone call to Dean Porio, Owner & Manager of Top Gun Powder Coating Company of Jasper, GA, put me on the right track. He suggested that I bring all the disassembled car components to him for an estimate. I had planned to totally disassemble it before painting anyway, so I did so, loaded all the parts in my truck and off I went.

This is how the parts looked before powder coating.

I arrived at the Top Gun Powder Coating facility and was greeted by Deans wife, Danielle. I then met Dean and we walked out to the truck to look at the parts. He looked them over carefully and we discussed different options such as color, primer or no primer etc. His service included a hot degreasing cleaning, and also blasting with some type of plastic media. He worked up a quote, which I accepted and I left the mess with him. About a week later, he called and said that all was ready and I could come pick it up the finished parts.

This is the frame, springs, front and rear axle assembly. A protective wrap material was put on most of the items, and the rest was padded as they loaded it in my truck.

The picture above shows the other items. Not pictured are the fenders and the inside of the curved dash, they were also coated. Looks kind of like a CDO chassis kit. If I ever build another car, I will plan on having the steel parts being powder coated from the very beginning. I would degrease, pressure wash every new piece of steel purchased before beginning work on it. I didnt this time because I was concerned about rust. It gets pretty humid here in Georgia. I would not have to be concerned about rust, knowing it would be blasted before coating anyway. I have started to reassemble the parts of the chassis and I can not begin to tell you how nice it is to work with something as clean as the parts are now. It is like putting a kit together. Until next time, Terry

Visiting Old & New Friends and Sharing Events Together

By

Lee Thevenet

Just as in the past four years, my wife, Elaine & I will make the journey to the beautiful State of North Carolina soon to visit our friends, Jim & Daphene Peach. Usually by the first days in October, the temperatures start dropping and make traveling much more comfortable. This years trip will be different, as I will be towing the transport trailer containing my 1906 Ford N Replica. I had intended to take the trailer & carriage along last year, but decided not to at the last minute and regretted not doing so. On last years visit, Jim & I along with another HCR builder & good friend, Larry Cook, visited a yearly event called Cotton Ginning Days. The event takes place on the weekend of October 8th, 9th & 10th. Always the second weekend of October. More about this event can be found at: http://www.co.gaston.nc.us/parksandrec/cottonginningdays/index.htm The event features real time cotton ginning in a restored mill on location. Also features a very large tractor show, hit/miss engine show, a few cars & a swap meet. Last year, Jim & I also took in a local car show in a nearby town. Really enjoyed these two events in the past but did not have my car. Hopefully this year, the three of us will have our cars at the event. On our return trip to Louisiana, we will be visiting yet another friend, Terry Wright, group member & writer of the previous article My First Car. He and his wife, Sandra, have graciously invited us to stay as guests in their home the weekend of October 15th. While there, we will be joining Terry in a local parade. Terry will be driving his newly completed CDO and I will be driving the Ford N. My wife and I are really looking forward to both, the visit with the Wrights & the parade. When taking part in an event such as a parade away from home, you know few people there, so photos are very rare, but Terry assured me there would be plenty of friends or family members at the event taking photos for the November/December Issue of the HCR News..:)

My HCR Lock Downs

ByBob Ferry oldgascar

I transport my HCR in a 6 x 12 enclosed trailer. The running boards make the car so wide, that I had to paint drive guide lines on the ramp and the floor of the trailer. The car has about 3 inches of clearance on each side of the running boards when I drive through the door. I devised a way to prevent the rear wheels from rolling and to keep the car from moving side to side while the trailer is in motion. I made a wood triangle shaped stop block and mounted it to the floor, at the front of the trailer. The front tires rest against it while in transit and a ratchet strap is connected to the front axle. I installed a Dring tie down in the floor, forward of the wooden stop for the other strap hook.

Loading & Unloading drive guide lines on ramp & floor, D ring in floor at rear door of trailer for rear ratchet strap.

Front tires resting on front angle stop. Strap holding car against front stop
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Left Wheel Lock

Left Wheel Lock

Slotted steel plate on left wheel lock (slips on the stud under the washer)

Stud Threaded stud

Wing Nut

Stud with nut and washer welded to it for the slotted steel plate to slip on

Threaded Stud

Left side outer plate in place with wing nut holding it in place

Both rear wheels with locks installed and 1 X 4 board standing on edge and connected to the threaded studs on the back of each lock with wing nuts. Ratchet strap connected & tightened also.

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Questions should be directed to Bob Ferry (oldgascar) on the Yahoo HCR Blog Site

Wear period clothing when driving HCR carriages

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How & Why we get Standards

by Everett Moore Does the expression, "We've always done it that way" ring any bells? Railroads have been around all of our lives We accept their massive size and structure with little thought about how that size was, originally, determined. The US standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet 8.5 inches. That is an exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge used? Because that's the way they built them in England, and English expatriates built the original US Railroads. Why did the English build them like that? Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that's the gauge they used. Why did "they" use that gauge then? Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building wagons, which used that wheel spacing. So.....Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing? Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels might break on some of the old, long distance roads in England, because that's the spacing of the wheel ruts. So who built those old rutted roads? Imperial Rome built the first long distance roads in Europe (and England) for their legions. These roads have been used ever since. Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels. Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome, they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing. The United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is derived from the original specifications for an Imperial Roman war chariot. And bureaucracies live forever. So the next time you are handed a specification and wonder what horse's behind came up with it, you may be exactly right, because the Imperial Roman war chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the back ends of two war horses. Now the twist to the story...

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There's an interesting extension to the story about railroad gauges and horses' behinds. When we see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two big booster rockets attached to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are solid rocket boosters, or SRBs. The SRBs are made by Thiokolat at their factory at Utah. The engineers who designed the SRBs might have preferred to make them a bit larger, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory happens to run through a tunnel in the mountains. The SRBs had to fit through that tunnel. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track is about as wide as two horses' behinds. So, a major Space Shuttle design feature of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse's rear-end

An E-Mail from Stu!

Now for the Truckopher It's now finished and is fun to drive. Not many have such a flash 'personal mobility scooter' to ride around on! Refer to the attached photos. It gets some strange looks from pedestrians when I pass them on my way to pick up the paper/groceries at our local store. The basic unit is made by Fortress in Canada. It runs on two 12 volt batteries at about 15 mph (I tweaked the electronic controls) and gives me about 3 hours running under full load, flat out. My mother-in-law made a nice job of the seat cushion Cheers Stu

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Heard about the Abbotts?

by Lee

Last March I took a detour on my way to Chickasha, Oklahoma for the Pre War Swap Meet there. I drove North to the city of Pine Bluff, Arkansas especially to meet & visit with an interesting member of our HCR Group. His name is Bob Abbott, Owner & Operator of Abbott Tachograph. Bob had contacted me by E-Mail & we discussed over a few exchanges, his wish to build a HCR line of cars, namely, the CDO. This captured my imagination to the fullest. I could visualize eighteen wheelers rolling again carrying loads of CDOs again, just like the Fort Lauderdale plants. A one night stay at my Dads brothers home in Little Rock & he & I set off for Pine Bluff early the following day. We arrived at the Abbot facility & was greeted by his secretary & soon by the man himself. Bob took my uncle & I on a grand tour of the plant. We soon learned that the plant assembles & sells clock like mechanisms that fit on the wheel hubs of trucks, that record the time, distance traveled, how many stops & the amount of time the vehicle stopped. The tour was fascinating to say the least. After showing us around the plant, Bob let me see all the plans & research he had collected over the years to help him with his wish of a car line. He then asked us to accompany him to view his latest purchase. It was a green, four passenger replica CDO he had just purchased. We then followed him outside the plant to an outer storage area where he had a couple of more CDO replicas in need of some repairs.

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It had been about five months since I had seen or heard from Bob, then the other day he sent me some pictures of several more CDO HCRs he had recently purchased including a transport trailer.

It is starting to look like Bob will need to put up more buildings real soon just to house his growing collection of HCRs

HCR Member Decals

by Gerry Hale

After ordering & receiving some HCR Member Decals from Lee, I put a Gold colored one on each side of the "Pie Wagon" and a Black one on the display that I take to the car shows, they all looked GREAT!! Now, I was looking over my pick up truck trying to find a spot for another decal that would be a attention getter, and, it looked good just about anywheres Id put it, BUT, it still wasn't the attention getter that I wanted.

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Here in Florida, just as in some other states (like Louisiana); we only have the rear license plate. People go out and buy all kinds of license plates for the front. Until now, I had the outline of my ultra light airplane on the front of my P.U., but it was getting pretty well worn and also, I have the plane up for sale, so I came up with a new idea. What could be better then a license plate with the "Pie Wagon" along with the HRC decal on it for the front? I thought I could print a copy of the Pie, have it laminated and put the decal on, I was having trouble getting the proper size for the plate when a friend who has a better photo program stopped by and said he thought he could do it for me. He came up with the proper size and we discussed different ways of getting the results I desired. I decided to call our local printer, who had the answer. He said he could make me a license plate, so we put the photo on a CD, along with the decal, and took everything to the Printer. He made the decal just a little bit larger, to look good on the plate. SO now I have the "attention getter" that I was looking for and hopefully get some local builders busy making saw dust.

Bulletin Board
Hello Builders, In the past month there have been a couple of major changes in the HCR hobby as some of us knew it. Because of personal reasons, I resigned as moderator of the soon to be closed Yahoo Horseless Carriage Replica Group & started my own new Yahoo Group using the name HCR Builders Group. Hopefully the members will come to realize, this was a move to help the hobby of HCR building move forward. I do invite all to join the new group at: http://dir.groups.yahoo.com/group/HCRBuildersGroup/

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All about the HCR Logos

by Lee Thevenet This is a website This is a group

www.HorselessCarriageReplicas.com

In the past couple of weeks, I have been asked many questions concerning these two logos. The one question that sticks in my mind, was from a builder who had purchased two large logo decals for his trailer, asking if there would be some sort of overlay to add to his decals so they would not be outdated by not looking like the new HCR Builders Group Logo. Hopefully this explanation will clear this matter. The logo on the left with the website address underneath is the logo that was designed by me and Mr. James Peach to represent the Horseless Carriage Replica Hobby a few years back. It is the Official registered HCR logo, with the website address under it. There is no other like it & it will not change. The logo on the right; also designed by myself & Mr. Peach, to represent the HCR Builders Group. It is the same logo with the words HCR Builders Group within the outer circle & contains a light shade of blue to go with the new Groups Home Page. All the members that belonged to the original HCR Group, basically still belong to the same group, only the name has changed The old Yahoo Group, Horseless Carriage Replicas will close its doors on September 1, 2010 and all present memberships will be deleted. Members need to move their membership over to the HCR Builders Group before Sept 1 or will have to go through the Yahoo sign-up process again. As shown above, the new group falls within the symbol of Horseless Carriage Replicas. Com. Logo. The website, acts as a gate way to the HCR Builders Group by being linked to the Groups Main Page. The website has been getting about 300-350 hits a month & out of that, the HCR Builders Group will probably recruit 10-20 new members a month. The period of June 30, 2010 to Aug 2, 2010 was exceedingly good as the website got 2,098 hits, many finding out about the HCR Hobby & the HCR Builders Group for the first time
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Items For Sale

Do we have any readers out there that still fly & would like to own their own aircraft? This just might be what you are looking for Good friend, builder & member of our ranks, Gerry Hale, from Lake City, Florida is hanging up his wings & putting his ultra light up for sale. Just recently, he mentioned it to me, so I asked if he wanted to give our readers a Heads Up on it first Here is his information RANS S 12 XL, ELSA, 2004, 98 Hr TT. Always Hangered, Cabin Storage Cover, ROTAX 582 (65 HP), Electric Start, Oil Injection, Partial Enclosure, Wheel pants, Tail wheel, VSI, Electronic Altimeter, Slip Indicator, Fuel Pressure Gauge, Compass, Electric Fuel Pump, Elevator Trim Center Panel Mount, Adj. lift struts, ELT, Pilot III GPS, EIS, In-Flight Flaps, Extra 9 Gal wing tank 18 gal. total, Rad Head Sets (2) w/intercom, strobes, Warp drive prop, landing light, Muffler Plated Narco Radio, Clear Coat. $19,500 Contact Gerry Hale, ransman@comcast.net (386) 758-7857 Located at Cannon Creek Airpark (15FL) Lake City, FL.

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In the Next Issue of the HCR News News On To the Next Project by Stu Martyn Where does he get all that energy?
Tune in to the next issue of HCR News when I will feature more of Stus latest project where he will attempt to install This engine Inside of This boat hull

Using HCR Plans

With the recent FREE Speedster Plans page sets on the HCR Builders Group, I have come to understand completely what the builder & plans designer, Everett Moore & I talked about a few years back, where we agreed that builders simply do not read the text in plans. It is usually a joking matter when you hear of a guy attempting to put together a bicycle from Wal Mart & winding up with extra parts or worse, the wrong part in the wrong place, simply by not reading the instructions given in the box. I have not really had a problem with this until last week. I had always attributed it to mixing pictures & drawings with text & more or less, forcing the builder to read the directions in the plans. To me blueprints or drawings simply do not say enough about components fitting together; it just simply needs text to go along to accomplish this. Usually the questions asked, are answered in the text of the plans, all the builder needs to do, is read... Lee

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also in the next issue

I will do a special tribute to the father who inspired his son to build this beautiful CDO replica so that they could ride together in the 2010 4th of July parade. Plus, can you guess where this replica CDO was on display?

A Big Thanks!
To The three builders who volunteered to be Advisors to the HCR Builders Group Everett Moore Bob Evans & Warren Johnson I will soon be contacting each of you to discuss how much the job pays Well everyone, it looks like Id better keep something for the next time Horseless Carriage Replicas brings you builders & readers another issue of the HCR Newsletter Keep On Building! Lee Thevenet Horseless Carriage Replicas
www.HorselessCarriageReplicas.com

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